DVRs stuff up viewing figures

Figures which show Americans watching less television have failed to take into account the rise of DVRs. According to a Neilson poll, Americans are watching as much television as ever but are time shifting their viewing.

US households that have a DVR only watch the content less than half the time that it is broadcast.

Neilson has revealed that all of prime-time broadcast content had been watched either live or via time-shifted DVR playback in those households. If you take into account DVR playback, commercial ad viewership increased however, it's clear that about half of all DVR users are happy to make use of their DVRs' ad-skipping abilities.